New technologies allow you to know where your kids are every moment of the day. The question is, is that more than you want to know?
Todd Morris, the CEO of BrickHouse Security , began selling spy gear to police departments and other professionals. Today, a large part of his business comes from parents. He provides solutions to parents who want to watch their nannies at work via hidden webcams, parents who want to record their kids' Internet conversations, and parents who want to monitor how far or fast their kids are driving.
“I entered the consumer market by demand,” says Morris. “These devices are scaled down, less expensive, easier to use versions of the professional tools.” Morris, by the way, uses a nanny camera in his own home to watch his young child and sitter. His camera is disguised as an air freshener, and the nanny has no idea that she’s being recorded. Is it spying or is it being a good parent?
There’s not a parent who doesn’t wish they that they could be omnipresent, keeping their children from harm. Yet every parent confronts the question of balance. When is it over the top to monitor your kids and when do kids deserve some privacy, trust, and the chance to be independent?
Lost and Found
Some of the biggest selling items in the kids monitoring world are what I call “electronic fences.” These rely on some sort of location-based tracking system that lets you pinpoint your child’s location, wherever they may be.
With younger kids it’s fairly easy to make an argument for using trackers. They wander and often they wander in very public spaces. Kid trackers are the electronic equivalent of those harnesses that parents often tied onto their kids in the shopping malls.
The parent holds a base unit and slaps a bracelet on the child. The bracelet emits a radio frequency so that when the child leaves a specified range (say 500 feet) an alarm sounds on the base unit. The base unit can then be put into "find mode," indicating your proximity to the child. The IonKids base unit can monitor up to four tamper-proof bracelets simultaneously—one for every kid in the family.
Households with young children and two working parents often rely on nanny cams, inexpensive digital video recorders. Many of these cameras are wireless and can be hidden almost anywhere, from inside a plant to a stuffed animal. Some let you watch your kids at play on a website; others send reports to your phone. Parents who use the cameras say that there’s a tremendous peace of mind in being able to see what’s going on at home when they’re not around. Those who use it don’t have a problem with spying on the nanny.
As kids get older their world gets bigger. Monitoring often relies on cellphone technology. A company called Guardian Angel makes cellphones that come pre-installed with tracking software. When the child is out with their cellphone, the parent can log onto a website and see exactly where they are. A similar service is offered by My Mobile Watchdog. You’ll receive an immediate alert if your child receives any unapproved email, text messages, or phone calls. It will even track their text message conversations. Kajeet makes a specially outfitted phone that lets you put a finite amount of money on it for the kids to use, sets time limits and who you can talk to and text on the phone, and locates your kids when they have their phone turned on.
According to a survey done by , more than two-thirds of parents of young children are "extremely worried" for their child's well-being, and nearly half (41%) of mothers with children under six said they were in favor of location tracking.
Can You Do It in a Car?
Some new technologies have been created to let you monitor the kids in the car as well. These devices can record where you drove to, how long it took, the speed you were going, and more. You’ll know unequivocally whether the kids went to Tommy’s to study, as they said, or whether they decided to travel to a neighboring town for a party. The CarChip logs up to 300 hours of driving trip details including time/date, distance traveled, and speed. You can set up an alarm to notify kids should they go over the speed limit. Recently, Ford Motor Company announced that this year their new cars will also have chips that monitor speed and location.
Nervous enough yet? There’s no end to high-tech offerings that can prey on parental fears. There are cameras being installed in schools so that parents can watch what the class is doing. There are home drug-testing kits. The scariest one I’ve seen is a bulletproof backpack that kids can wear to school.
So what’s a diligent parent to do? My personal preference would be to not have to rely on technology to monitor my kids. Call me old fashioned, but I would like to believe that we can have a little more faith in our kids, in ourselves, and in our communities, and avoid the spy-gear scene.
That said, we live in a complicated world. Two-earner households can’t spend as much time being around our kids as we’d like. Technology can help us feel closer, more involved, and in control.
What do you think? Are remote monitors and sensors the way to better parenting or not?
Keeping Track of the Kids
New technologies allow you to know where your kids are every moment of the day. The question is, is that more than you want to know?Todd Morris, the CEO of BrickHouse Security , began selling spy gear to police departments and other professionals. Today, a large part of his business comes from parents. He provides solutions to parents who want to watch their nannies at work via hidden webcams, parents who want to record their kids' Internet conversations, and parents who want to monitor how far or fast their kids are driving.
“I entered the consumer market by demand,” says Morris. “These devices are scaled down, less expensive, easier to use versions of the professional tools.” Morris, by the way, uses a nanny camera in his own home to watch his young child and sitter. His camera is disguised as an air freshener, and the nanny has no idea that she’s being recorded. Is it spying or is it being a good parent?
There’s not a parent who doesn’t wish they that they could be omnipresent, keeping their children from harm. Yet every parent confronts the question of balance. When is it over the top to monitor your kids and when do kids deserve some privacy, trust, and the chance to be independent?
Lost and Found
Some of the biggest selling items in the kids monitoring world are what I call “electronic fences.” These rely on some sort of location-based tracking system that lets you pinpoint your child’s location, wherever they may be.With younger kids it’s fairly easy to make an argument for using trackers. They wander and often they wander in very public spaces. Kid trackers are the electronic equivalent of those harnesses that parents often tied onto their kids in the shopping malls.
The parent holds a base unit and slaps a bracelet on the child. The bracelet emits a radio frequency so that when the child leaves a specified range (say 500 feet) an alarm sounds on the base unit. The base unit can then be put into "find mode," indicating your proximity to the child. The IonKids base unit can monitor up to four tamper-proof bracelets simultaneously—one for every kid in the family.
Households with young children and two working parents often rely on nanny cams, inexpensive digital video recorders. Many of these cameras are wireless and can be hidden almost anywhere, from inside a plant to a stuffed animal. Some let you watch your kids at play on a website; others send reports to your phone. Parents who use the cameras say that there’s a tremendous peace of mind in being able to see what’s going on at home when they’re not around. Those who use it don’t have a problem with spying on the nanny.
As kids get older their world gets bigger. Monitoring often relies on cellphone technology. A company called Guardian Angel makes cellphones that come pre-installed with tracking software. When the child is out with their cellphone, the parent can log onto a website and see exactly where they are. A similar service is offered by My Mobile Watchdog. You’ll receive an immediate alert if your child receives any unapproved email, text messages, or phone calls. It will even track their text message conversations. Kajeet makes a specially outfitted phone that lets you put a finite amount of money on it for the kids to use, sets time limits and who you can talk to and text on the phone, and locates your kids when they have their phone turned on.
According to a survey done by , more than two-thirds of parents of young children are "extremely worried" for their child's well-being, and nearly half (41%) of mothers with children under six said they were in favor of location tracking.
Can You Do It in a Car?
Some new technologies have been created to let you monitor the kids in the car as well. These devices can record where you drove to, how long it took, the speed you were going, and more. You’ll know unequivocally whether the kids went to Tommy’s to study, as they said, or whether they decided to travel to a neighboring town for a party. The CarChip logs up to 300 hours of driving trip details including time/date, distance traveled, and speed. You can set up an alarm to notify kids should they go over the speed limit. Recently, Ford Motor Company announced that this year their new cars will also have chips that monitor speed and location.Nervous enough yet? There’s no end to high-tech offerings that can prey on parental fears. There are cameras being installed in schools so that parents can watch what the class is doing. There are home drug-testing kits. The scariest one I’ve seen is a bulletproof backpack that kids can wear to school.
So what’s a diligent parent to do? My personal preference would be to not have to rely on technology to monitor my kids. Call me old fashioned, but I would like to believe that we can have a little more faith in our kids, in ourselves, and in our communities, and avoid the spy-gear scene.
That said, we live in a complicated world. Two-earner households can’t spend as much time being around our kids as we’d like. Technology can help us feel closer, more involved, and in control.
What do you think? Are remote monitors and sensors the way to better parenting or not?